Beloved
by SunKing
Summary: Three hundred years since he had seen her, and now he would see her again. It was as if a rope tugged directly on his heart, leading him to the place where she waited; silent and still, she waited. REPOST
1. Beloved

He ghosted across the darkened earth, making no more sound than the whisper of rain that sluiced down his cheeks and nose. Had he wanted to halt his steps, he was quite sure he would not have been able to. Three hundred years since he had seen her, and now he would see her again. It was as if a rope tugged directly on his heart, leading him to the place where she waited; silent and still, she waited.

The stones around him carried the burden of age, draped in choking ivy, worn smooth by time and relentless precipitation. His fingers traced the letters of the familiar names—names from his time in this place. _Michael Newton. Lauren Crowley. Angela Cheney. _At that one, he stopped. Carefully, he placed a reverent hand on the top of the stone and caressed it gently. His love had loved Angela. His love had found Angela's company to be soothing and happy. For that, he was eternally grateful to the soul who had passed almost two hundred and thirty years before. He wished there was a way to let that beautiful girl know that she had not been forgotten; that someone thought of her even now.

He could see his destination in the distance. The cenotaph stood tall and proud, glimmering almost mystically in the twilight. Not even the cover of night could diminish the monument to his beloved. How he wished he could have been there for her. Long fingers clutched at his chest, knowing that if the heart below still beat, they would cheerfully pluck that heart from its cavity.

He had one more stop to make before he could see her. One more person to whom he would pay his long overdue respects, and then he would lay his eternal devotion at her feet.

_CHARLES SWAN_

Seeing the name, etched into the cold edifice, brought him to his knees. This man who loved his beloved, who showed his devotion to her in the most endearing and awkward of ways, deserved more than this worn rock. His remains should be housed in the finest of marble tombs. Charlie, however, had been a simple man, with simple desires, and Edward knew in his heart that anything bigger than this simple marker would have embarrassed the man.

Not for the first time, he wished that he could cry. Dry sobs heaved his body forward onto the sodden earth, and he clung with all of his might to the evidence of Charles Swan's life. That same evidence was also a testament to her; that she, too, had once lived.

Memories flooded his mind, unbidden. The last time he had seen Charlie had been the day the world lost its light. Charlie had stood, a broken man, as the final stone had been placed. Bella was gone, and with her the sun. Edward had watched from the shadows of the forest that surrounded the little white church as the whole town had gathered in her honor. That church had long since succumbed to time.

He was aware that time was passing, and yet he could not find the strength to move. The day she ceased to exist, Edward did as well. His family had tried so hard to understand, but the anguish of losing her had sent him half-mad. From the moment Alice had seen her take the dive, Edward had become a shell of his former self. He had still taken up space, yes, but that was the extent of it. Suddenly, it had been as if he were staring at the world through the bottom of a thick glass. Colors were there, but with no apparent shape. He was aware of sounds, but they seemed to be in some language that he had not yet learned. Twenty years passed before he spoke his first word: Bella.

Leaving was supposed to be the _right _thing to do. Bella should have found love with a boy, married and raised a family, and died an old lady with a heart full of beautiful memories. Edward had hoped that maybe he would feature prominently in those memories, of course, but he wanted them to be fond remembrances of a first love. Instead, she had hurled herself into the seething ocean, never to be found again.

His family had grieved, as well. Alice had been inconsolable for a decade, unable to face the rest of the family; namely, Edward. Jasper had carried with him the crushing guilt, sure that he was the reason for the decision to leave. Emmett seemed to have forgotten how to laugh, and Rosalie even showed her sadness in her own way. Carlisle and Esme had been the hardest to face, though. His loving parents had been convinced that Bella would be Edward's savior. Her very presence had put a light in dear Esme's eyes, and her absence had snuffed it forever.

Here, so close to her final resting place, he was able to see and hear again. The green of the trees was oppressive. She had not been fond of the color green. To her, it meant wet, cold, sunless, and pungent. Bella had been convinced that green was even a _smell. _The rain that had been scarcely a whisper upon his entry of the churchyard now seemed to thunder in his ears. He could hear each individual drop as it landed on each blade of grass. The return of his senses was both a blessing and a curse. He had begged whatever higher power to allow him to feel again, but now that sensation had returned, so had the pain.

Edward doubled over again, feeling completely eviscerated for perhaps the thousandth time. Wracking sobs heaved his body once more as he crawled across the cemetery floor to her memorial. With each inch of travel, he could feel the weight of three hundred years of grief crushing his shoulders, pressing him further into the marshy ground. It seemed as if hours had passed before he was able to trace the letters of her name.

_ISABELLA MARIE SWAN_

_BELOVED_

She most certainly was. Even now, Edward's heart sang with love for his mate, ripped too soon from his arms. The cold stone felt warm against his fingers, as if life itself pulsed beneath them. If he closed his eyes, he could almost imagine that he was once again touching the precious pulse at her neck, the glorious lifeblood that had flowed there. How cavalier her decision to give that up! And, oh, how he wished he could take back his own devastating choice.

Three hundred years of waiting had not been enough. He was not yet ready for the maddening despair that settled in his heart. The agony was crippling, in every sense. Three hundred years of constant, self-inflicted solitude had not been punishment enough for his selfishness. What utter madness had possessed him to believe that either could survive without the other? Bella had been the lucky one. Her escape had been quick and relatively painless. Edward, however, was still dying a slow, merciless death, and would continue to do so for all eternity.

Time lost all meaning as he clutched at her sepulcher. His clawing fingers dug into the unforgiving marble, creating no more damage than three hundred years of erosion had managed. He could not bear to think about the day when the pillars would eventually fall and return to the earth from whence it came. The house where Bella had lived had surrendered to the elements two centuries before, taking with it the memories of a first love discovered. The photographs and mementos were now as much a part of history as his precious mate.

Somewhere in the deepest recesses of his mind, Edward could sense that the night was drawing to a close. Within moments, the sun would begin its ascent, and his precious hours with Bella would be over. Even with the cover of clouds, he couldn't risk being spotted clinging to a centuries old grave. Slowly, painfully, he unfurled his arms and pressed his hands to the ground.

"Three hundred years, to the day," a voice spoke. Edward acted on instinct, flinging himself behind the tomb in a flash. He cowered, covering his ears, knowing that he would hear the speaker anyway.

"I told myself you'd never come. No, actually, you told me you'd never come. And I still watched every day, praying that you would. Three hundred years, I watched, to the day."

Edward was sure that he was hallucinating. It wouldn't have been the first time he was certain he heard her voice or saw her chocolate curls. But it wasn't her voice, exactly. This voice made Bella's voice seem rough and uncultured. This voice sounded like all the angels singing at once; the pealing of a bell would have been crude in comparison. He had yet to find his own voice to respond.

"I had hoped I'd receive a more satisfying answer," the voice sighed.

Edward cautiously lifted himself from the floor of the monument, searching for the source of the first hope he'd experienced in three centuries.

"You're every bit as beautiful as I'd feared you would be," she whispered, choking a bit on the words. "Ever so much more beautiful than I remembered."

"Are you really here?" Edward finally found words, but they were not what he had promised himself he would say if he were to ever see her again.

"I am," she affirmed.

"Are you an angel?" he gasped, taking a shaky step in her direction.

"Far from it. I believe you once used the word 'monster.' Eternally damned is another favorite of mine."

"Impossible." His words were no louder than a whisper of silk, but she heard him clearly. Without thinking first, he attempted to slip into her mind. Perhaps he would find it easier now she was of his kind.

"It won't work," she said coldly.

"I deserve your anger," he said contritely.

"Oh, I don't know. You did come back to me, didn't you?" she said coyly, twirling a luminous finger through her luscious curls.

He was entranced by her again, as if no time had passed at all. His eyes greedily drank in her features. They were even more perfect than his memory had allowed. She carried herself with a confidence that her human incarnation had never mastered.

"I would have gladly died that day," he ground out. Not for the first time, he wished that he could shed tears. It seemed that they were stuck somewhere around his throat, constricting his vocal cords.

"And what good would that have done?" Bella snipped. "Certainly no more good than you leaving in the first place."

"Oh, God, Bella. I _did _die that day! I ceased to exist the moment you leapt from that cliff. How are you here? We were all certain you had been lost to the sea."

"Victoria is how I am here," she answered simply. "After she turned me, Jacob and the rest of the tribe protected me through my newborn phase. During my third month, I was able to avenge my own death when I followed Victoria to Lithuania. She was no match for my newborn strength."

Edward longed to touch her, to hold her in his arms, but he knew that it was the last thing he deserved.

"Can you forgive me, my love?" he whispered. "I know I may not have visited for three hundred years, but you were in every thought. I have done nothing of consequence since the day I left you, only curled up in a ball and rocked myself into a welcome oblivion. I have studied nothing but the lines of your face as my memory could recall them. My family is no longer bound with the strength we once had, for none of us can function without our eighth member."

Edward could focus on nothing but her glorious face. He was fleetingly aware that the day was proving to be a sunny one, though the trees had thus far shielded the cemetery occupants from the sun's rays. He found himself praying for one slim finger of light to break through and land upon her face. She deserved endless sunlight.

"You visited my father before you came to me," she said, her voice taking a strange tone.

"I did," Edward conceded. "I wanted to pay tribute to the man who gave you life. Who loved you more than I had the courage to. I know he stood by you every day, and grieved for you until the day he died. He deserved my respect."

At his words, Bella's features softened. "You wept over my grave for six hours."

"I would gladly have wept for the next three hundred years, had I not feared being discovered," he confessed.

"You left to protect me," she stated.

"I thought it would, at the time." He nodded.

"You'd have done better stay," she said, wryly.

"Had I the chance to do it all over, I would stay by your side for all eternity," he vowed. "I would have married you, and taken you with me into our own forever."

"I find that possibility much more enticing than my own fate," Bella mused.

"Is it too late?" Edward heard himself ask. "What am I saying? Of course it's too late. And I can only blame myself."

Bella studied the beautiful boy in front of her. His eyes were black as pitch, his copper locks as unruly as ever. She had thought him utterly angelic when seen through human eyes, but nothing could have prepared her for the sheer perfection she saw with a vampire's sight. His build was still slight, but powerful, and that would never change. The circles under his eyes are what finally reached her, though. He looked like a man who had not slept in years. The haggard bruises bore witness, even to her hardened heart, to the turmoil inside his mind.

"I once heard someone say that vampires mate for life," she said casually. Edward felt his breath catch, and if his heart still beat, it would have given a great thump. "That there is no pain you might feel that I cannot assuage, and there is no heartache that I might suffer that you cannot soothe. I imagine now would be as good a time as any to put that theory to the test."

Edward could not believe the immense joy that filled his entire being at her words. She would let him love her again! She was still here, with him, and she would give him another chance! He felt as if he might be living a dream, but as she approached him slowly, he prayed he would never wake.

She reached out a timid hand, and he took it eagerly. Without even thinking, he twined their fingers together. It felt, in that moment, as if no time had passed since they had last touched.

"I'd like to see my family, please," she commanded quietly.

As he had already decided that he would give her anything she desired for the rest of their existence, it was an easy request to fulfill. He tugged her close and buried his nose in her hair. Gone was the smell of strawberries and freesia that had marked her as a teenage girl. In their place was the fragrance of Bella herself, and it was more ambrosial than the very nectar of the gods.

They walked hand in hand through the monuments to the dead. Edward stopped again to whisper his love to Charlie and Angela before leading his beloved to the churchyard gates. Just before she stepped through, the sun heeded his request and kissed Bella's face. She turned and allowed him to drink in the sight, as she studied his face unabashedly.

"You're even more beautiful than I remembered," they both said, their voices creating a divine harmony.


	2. Prodigal

The heavy rain that coursed down the windowpanes distorted even Carlisle's exceptional vision. Deep in the recesses of his mind, a long suppressed melancholy took root and began to spread. She was always a presence in every mind, even Rosalie's. She had been the hope, the chance for salvation, the morning sun in an endless night. She had made Edward laugh again, and then she was gone, stealing not only the light she had brought, but also any light that had been present before.

Watching his son suffer the agony of her death had nearly broken Carlisle. Though moody and particular, Edward had always possessed the softest of hearts. He had waited patiently for his first love, knowing that second-best would never be an option. Instead of accepting the first offer that came his way, just to end the pain of a solitary existence, he had suffered silently, waiting, hoping against all hope, for her.

And arrive she did! Though she was quiet, unassuming, and meek, she had nearly torn the family to pieces on her first day in Forks. Carlisle had thoroughly enjoyed watching her grow and learn to handle each of his family members in turn. There was no doubt in anyone's mind that she was Edward's match in every way—save one. Jasper had spectacularly called attention to that difference, and the world stood still once more.

"Do you think he's okay?" Esme asked, moving to stand next to her husband at the window.

She had asked the same question almost every day for exactly three centuries, and she would continue to do so. Her heart no longer beat, but it was capable of holding more love than any other being that Carlisle had ever known.

He reached up a steady hand and gently caressed her cheek, offering the closest thing to a smile that he could manage. There wasn't a definitive answer that he could give her.

"Edward will never be..." he began, but he couldn't bring himself to finish. What could he say? Edward will never again be whole? It was certainly true, but entirely too painful to speak aloud.

"Has it really been so long?" Esme murmured, leaning in to her lover's touch. She was broken for her son, but who could fully understand his pain? If she were to lose Carlisle, there was little doubt that she'd be unable to continue on. The ties between soul mates were intangible, and yet stronger than any earthly element. The very idea of breaking that bond, of severing the lifeline that made existence bearable... She couldn't fathom the utter agony that Edward must feel, and would feel every day for as long as he remained.

The loss that Esme felt was not unlike Edward's, for she had dearly loved the young girl, as any mother would a daughter. The fact that she had only spent months with Bella was inconsequential; the cord was tied fast. Esme had delighted in Bella's presence, and had filled a role in Bella's life that even Bella hadn't realized was missing. Never had Esme wanted to take the place of Renee, but the girl had clearly needed a mother figure. Charlie Swan did the very best that a stoic father could possibly do, but there were so many questions to which Bella would surely need answers. It had not been so long since Esme was a human teenager that she couldn't relate in some way to the emotions and hormones that whirled through Bella's frail form.

Esme felt that, if it were possible, she might weep for each of the days that Bella had been gone. The cleansing of tears was an impossibility, however, and so the outward expression of grief remained internalized for centuries and would continue to do so for untold centuries more.

Even with their thoughts otherwise focused, Carlisle and Esme heard the near-silent footfalls as Emmett approached. His mood was somber, though he was the first in the family to remember how to laugh.

"He's not back yet."

It wasn't a question, but a statement of immeasurable understanding.

"No," Esme said quietly, reaching out to grasp her son's hand. Usually one to turn emotion into humor, Emmett instead wrapped his arms around his mother and pulled her close. The sadness in the room was palpable, and he was willing, if only for a short time, to acquiesce to the gravity of the situation.

Edward was his favorite brother, though he worked to reassure Jasper as often as possible. There was no denying the affection that Edward's tender heart evoked, however, even if Emmett's first response was usually to make light of Edward's serious nature. Bella had been important to them all, even Emmett.

She was the little sister that Emmett had always imagined. His human family had been entirely comprised of boys, which were very fun in their own way. His little brothers had brought him no end of joy and laughter. The McCarty boys had been the hope of Morgan County, Tennessee. In fact, Emmett was certain that his "death" had sent shockwaves spiraling through his tiny town for decades.

Edward had been the one to talk him through his newborn phase, and to offer him a bit of fun when Emmett just really wanted to wrestle like a boy should. Rosalie, Edward's sister, had never held that same title for Emmett. From the moment he had opened his eyes on his new life, Rosalie had been his reason to be. Just as Bella had been Edward's.

Bella, who had literally stumbled into their tight-knit circle, had earned Emmett's love and respect with her sarcastic mouth and unmatched loyalty. Her blush had been a thing of beauty, though she was even more embarrassed each time it appeared. Emmett had made it a game, as any brother would, to see how often he could bring that color to her cheeks.

Losing her... losing his little sister had been the second most painful experience he had ever endured. He had never made it a secret that he wanted her to join their family, for he was never one to keep his wishes hidden. He could respect the fact that Edward had desired a full and happy life for her, but that certainly hadn't happened according to plan. His first instinct was to despise his brother for his selfishness—to allow the open wound to fester until it oozed hatred and spite. In denying Bella her wish to become one of them, he had denied the whole family her presence.

A smooth hand grasped his, and he turned to smile at his reason to be. Rosalie offered her own version of a smile, though her heart was as heavy as it had ever been. For three hundred years, she had clasped her own guilt tightly to her chest. Every year, on the anniversary of Bella's death, she allowed herself immersion into remorse as penance for the girl who might have become her sister.

Her regrets were many, so she took the time to list them one by one. "I should have told her that I could love her," Rosalie whispered. "I should have told her that I was beginning to."

Carlisle pulled his daughter close and pressed a kiss to the crown of her head. "We all wish for one last chance to speak the unspoken, love."

"But you all took the time when she was here. I held on to my jealousy for so long that I missed my opening. I lost every possibility of making her my sister and all because I was blinded by my own envy. I should have explained myself to her so she could see I was working toward a relationship with her. I should have told her that I had never seen Edward more alive than when he was with her, and for that reason alone, I could never hate her."

The four stood in silence and stared through the pounding rain for any sign of their beloved son and brother. Carlisle silently prayed that his son would find the strength to overcome this hurdle. Esme offered up hope that Edward might find some healing through his endeavor. Emmett willed his brother to find something that might once more bring him joy. Rosalie wished against all hope that she could somehow receive forgiveness for her selfishness.

The family member that carried the most guilt and shame watched his parents and siblings from the top of the stairs. Not for the first time, he cursed himself for his weakness. Jasper felt he deserved every ounce of anguish he absorbed from each member of his family, for he was the ultimate cause of the separation that led to Bella's death.

Bella had been a temptation from the very start. Her blood, though not as delicious to him as it was to Edward, was still a constant presence in the house. His struggle to let her walk out the door alive after each visit had left pools of venom in his mouth. Alice was the only person that could talk him down—Alice and her love for Bella.

It wasn't just the battle with self that left Jasper feeling bereft. He had truly cared for the girl when he allowed himself near her. Her unabashed joy around Edward had filled Jasper with happiness that only his love for Alice could match. Bella had been unashamed in her love, and unashamed was an emotion Jasper enjoyed very much.

As he made his way to join the family in their mourning, a ray of light broke through the darkness in his spirit. So intense was the emotion that he had to brace himself against the banister to keep from crumbling under the force of it. What place had joy in the house at that moment?

"Jasper?" Emmett called. The sound of creaking wood beneath Jasper's taut fingers had not gone unnoticed. "Will you join us?"

"Something—" Jasper gasped, teetering under the weight of the new sensation. There was only one person unaccounted for; all of the other faces were masks of sorrow. Only one could be the source of the happiness threatening to dispel his black mood. Alice had yet to appear. Alice had seen something that she didn't feel she could yet share.

With a head full of confusion and a heart full of distress, Jasper completed the journey to join his family. Their support began to heal his self-imposed torment, but his mind was still with Alice and her unnamed vision. The euphoria had eased into anticipation, and Jasper felt himself tensing for action, though he did not yet know what was coming.

As he struggled in silence, two things happened at once. A car approached the drive, and Alice appeared at the top of the stairs. The light in her eyes was impossible to ignore, and the family looked to her for any explanation that she might give. Instead, she pressed her lips together and shook her head.

"Not mine to tell," she whispered.

Instead, she joined the family at the window, and gloried in the sunlight that had finally broken through the clouds. The tension in the room seemed to manifest into a material form. All were burning to know what Alice saw, but none was willing to demand the answer. Together, they waited.

When the car finally emerged through the trees, a collective gasp was heard. Edward was not alone; he carried a passenger with him. Alice squealed in delight and flew to the door, nearly ripping the heavy cherry from its hinges. Jasper was immediately on her heels, while the rest of the family took a moment to gather their bearings.

"Is it possible?" Carlisle murmured, grasping Esme's hand tightly. She had no words to give him.

"Bella!" Emmett shouted, nudging Rosalie out of the way so that he could leap from the front porch in a single bound. He was opening the passenger door to the car before Edward had even managed to stop. Even in her new form, she was like a ragdoll in Emmett's massive arms.

He passed Bella into Alice's embrace, and watched proudly as the girls whispered their greetings to each other. The affection between the two friends seemed completely unaffected by a three hundred year absence. As everyone watched the tender reunion, each vowed to show Bella his or her love as soon and as often as possible.

She greeted each in turn and happily accepted Carlisle and Esme's title of daughter. With a raised eyebrow, she challenged Jasper to a real fight, and in a show of unprecedented understanding, she asked Rosalie if they might someday be sisters. In true Bella fashion, she had whirled back into the Cullen family and turned everyone directly back onto their ears.

None smiled brighter than Edward, however. Carlisle enfolded his son in his arms and held him tightly. As Bella tried to pass, he reached out and arm and pulled her close.

"Welcome home, Bella," he whispered, pressing a kiss to her temple. "And welcome home, Son."


	3. Sanguine

Edward once told Bella that there was no agony greater than that experienced during the change from human to vampire. At the time, she was inclined to believe him. When he told her goodbye, she was forced to modify her understanding of the word "pain." Surely, she believed, having the heart ripped, still beating, from her living body eclipsed any pain that had been felt before or would ever be felt after.

When she flung herself from the cliffs of La Push, it was not to end the pain, as everyone believed. She took the plunge in an effort to feel something, anything, again. Even if it was pain. Bella believed that any injury she could possibly suffer from the fall would only distract her from the never-ending misery of life without Edward. As the icy waters closed over her head, she knew that she had made the biggest mistake of her life. Nothing, not even the bone-chilling waters of the Pacific, could cover the gaping wound where her heart had once resided.

She almost welcomed the sight of Victoria's flame-like hair, as the wrathful vampire hovered above her in the wake of the crashing waves. The frigid waters only numbed Bella further. In Victoria, she saw a chance to burn.

And burn she did. For three days, just as Edward had said, Bella was consumed by searing flames on a pyre of hope. Even through the intense heat, the blistering anguish, Bella yearned for her lost love. When her eyes opened once more, and her bloody irises beheld the face of her oldest friend, the crushing realization that she would spend eternity without Edward threatened to finally finish her.

As she would learn, however, vampires were entirely too resilient to be destroyed by a mere broken heart. Crippled, yes. Damaged beyond repair, certainly. But in no way could she end her existence—not without the assistance of others. When her best friend refused to assist her with her demise, she remembered the Volturi. Edward had once threatened to visit these guardians of the vampire world, should he ever have to face life without her.

It seemed that the tables had turned, and she was the one contemplating suicide by angering several age-old vampires. The thought was all consuming. She allowed Jacob to slow her only long enough to gain control of her taste for human blood.

The months that she spent with Jacob might have been considered happy ones in another time and place. The two hunted together, and Bella even learned to laugh again. Always, at the back of her mind, she carried the knowledge that it would soon be over.

Almost as hard as saying goodbye to Edward, was saying goodbye to her father. Jacob, Sam, Embry, Quil, and Seth had all attended her funeral. They had all looked her grieving father in the eye and tried their very best to comfort him, knowing all the while that she was burning under the watchful eye of Emily. Bella had to exist with the knowledge that Charlie would never be able to see her again. When she was sure that she could control her thirst, she crept into his room as he slept and bid him a proper farewell. For the first time, she discovered a new excruciating truth—she was unable to weep. For months she had tried to stanch her tears, and now they would never again flow.

She left Forks one year after the date of her burial. In the darkest hour of the night, she visited her grave and said goodbye to the Bella that she had once been. Before the sun rose, bringing the dawn, she boarded a plane for Italy. Jacob and Emily begged her to reconsider, but her mind was set. She intended for the Volturi to destroy her the very moment she stepped into their presence.

What she did not expect to find was a jovial Aro. He was entranced with her ability to guard her thoughts and memories from his touch and refused to harm her. In fact, he offered her a position with his guard. As her mind reeled with the many ways that she could force his hand, he spoke the words that would turn her entire world upside down.

"He still loves you, our dear Edward. A vampire mates for life, _mia cara Bella."_

If it were possible for a vampire's heart to beat, Bella's would have begun again that very moment. The grey that had permeated her world turned swiftly to light and color, and she felt a true smile spread across her face. There were many reasons to distrust Aro's words, of course. Many reasons to believe that he intended to manipulate her emotions for what he might get out of her.

Bella refused to doubt. Instead, she clung to hope. Hope that Edward had not, in fact, meant his harsh words of goodbye. Hope that he would have found her if he knew she still existed. Deep in the recesses of her still and broken heart, she found the very truth she had possessed all along.

Edward loved her still.

She left Aro with the promise that she would visit Volterra once per year. He was quite understanding of her refusal to serve in the guard, especially with Edward still out there...somewhere. And she did keep her promise, too, for with every visit, Aro would share any news that he had of her beloved.

Aro asked once why she did not just seek Edward out on her own. With every year that she spent upon the Earth, with every death of the friends she had once known, her answer grew less relevant. She wanted, of course, for Edward to seek her. He had been the one to leave, to speak such horrible lies. Only when he returned to her with the truth on his tongue would she be ready to forgive.

For the first century of her second life, Bella travelled the world and saw things that once only existed in the textbooks of her history class. She watched as the Sydney Opera House donned a mantle of age; she felt the loss when the pyramids of Egypt continued to wither with the harsh desert winds. As the coast of Ireland was gradually swept away by the battering sea, she was reminded that nothing was permanent—not one thing. Even she herself would cease to exist should the sun ever abandon its perch in the heavens.

Each year, however, she would find her way back to the grave the marked the end of her first life. She would remember the love and the loss, and again she would hope. Hope against all reason that Edward would find her and speak again the words that she desperately wanted to hear.

The second century of her second life was much the same as the first. Bella lamented the hate and injustice that humans brought upon themselves. Murder, war, theft—did they not realize that life was fleeting and they only had one chance? As each atrocity chipped away at her stone heart, she fought the urge to find her family. For every time that she remembered the evanescence of life, she recalled that she would still endure.

Pride still overshadowed hope, even as she visited the one place she knew that Edward might find her. She resisted the advances of others, knowing she could never give her heart and refusing to settle for anything less than all-consuming love. Love as she had once known with Edward. Love she was certain she would one day experience again.

Still, even as the days dragged on during the third century, she couldn't help but doubt he would ever find her. She knew from her annual visits to Volterra that Edward still spoke of her, even after three hundred years. He still believed her to be dead, and he refused any hint that Aro gave him to the contrary. It seemed for all the hope that she possessed, there was still not enough left for her beloved.

In the graveyard, three hundred years from the day her first life ended, Bella resolved that pride had no place in a lover's heart. After her vigil, she would gather her strength and courage, to say nothing of the immense devotion that she possessed, and she would find her Edward. She would rejoin her family.

The moment her decision was made, she heard the ghostly creak of the rusted cemetery gate. The iron barrier was one of the only structures that had survived the passing of time, but the years were ready to claim a new victim. Whoever passed through the entrance did so quietly and reverently, which earned the dilapidated metal yet one more day of life.

She wanted to run to him. She could feel him there with her even before she could see him. Every nerve, every muscle, screamed at her to flee from her perch and find her home in his arms. Bella was ready to spring when she saw him, kneeling not at her grave, but at the headstone of her father. His body was shaking with the tears that Bella knew he could never shed, and his emotion was for her father. Charlie Swan, the man who gave Bella life and did the best that he knew how to protect her, was being honored by the other half of her soul. Suddenly, every muscle that had insisted that she go to him froze, and she could do nothing but watch.

Bella's eyes followed him as he dragged himself along the saturated earth to the spot where her remains were supposed to lie. Her heart twisted with every wrack of his sobs, but she left him there for six hours. Apparently, pride does have a place in a lover's heart.

Bella knew that the sun would rise soon and that she would likely lose her chance to speak, but she took one more moment to drink in the sight of his lithe form. He looked as though he had not fed in years, and Bella wondered if he had felt the same agony she had experienced. As she watched him place his hand on the age-worn stone one last time, she decided the harsh words of the past were no longer relevant.

Her love, her life, the very reason that she still existed, was waiting for her. Three hundred years was long enough. With a smile that eclipsed any before it, Bella went to rejoin her mate.


End file.
